


Whisper Of The Heart

by Alicorn



Category: Cat Returns
Genre: F/M, Fantasy, Gen, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-12
Updated: 2010-10-12
Packaged: 2017-10-12 15:06:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/126207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alicorn/pseuds/Alicorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or 'The Story of the Story Baron Gave Me'. Baron asks one simple task of a human, one that has never been completed...to write a story. His. Discontinued until edited. 2005 NANO.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

A very long Author's Foreword:

 _This story was written for the '05 Nanowrimo in Nov. where one's only point and reason for being is to write 50 K in one month. I sadly only got to 30 K, half of which was odds and ends that have not as yet been added to the story yet._

 _It is not by any means done, nor spell checked as well as if I had a beta..and yet in a silly way I am proud of this story for all it is so far._

 _I have to say I like some of the ideas I have formed about Baron's world here, and this is meant to be read as a simple fairy tale._

 _Also, having watched Whisper Of The Heart, the movie before TCR will help you to understand this story a lot better :)_

 _I cannot tell anymore if certain parts of this tale are deep or just long winded, but I can say that I never knew I had this sort of writing style in me. Genus or insanity brought about by too much soda and research on the subject of Barons?_

 _I'd like to add that although I have been a fan of The Cat Returns since I first got the Japanese DVD in 2003 I have not read any other TCR fanfic what so ever in order to keep my ideas 'pure' and unaffected by fandom. Not that there is anything wrong with fandom..._

The cat waited.

It was the type of waiting that befitted a saint and gave away the demeanor of an inanimate object.

Any sane object that still remembered the night the cat had arrived had long ago forgotten the reason for his tireless devotion beneath a trick lair of dust.

Still the moon wadded and waxed and time pasted for the two teenagers who had once spent one unforgettable summer there and where soon married.

The old man that had passed away many an hour rocking in his chair and recanting tales of World War II was, in that period, tearfully buried

by his grandchildren...

But the items of the old violin shop remained, as long and forgotten by time as the cats silent

dignity.

But of course one had to have dignity, even when picked by ones base and unceremoniously

wrapped with the Tokyo Times.

One had to have dignity, even when paid for by Paypal and shipped roughly overseas.

Yes, one had to have dignity, when it was all one had, and being a Baron it was expected...always.

Whisper Of The Heart 

_  
Or The Story of the Story Baron Gave Me   
_

**Chapter 1 : In which Girl Meets Cat, and Sanity is Questioned**

There was normal waiting and then there was this...

The girl paced hopefully by the street near her apartment complex, a bit of her dirty blond hair escaping its band before being placed grumpily back in its restraints with a worried hand.

More pacing.

It all came, she decided, from the fact that she did not have classes from twelve to three on Tuesday afternoons.

Yes, that was it.

That was the sole reason why her concrete composer and rock hard will had taken to the addictive practice of spending the last of her food budget month after month to the sinful chocolate like embrace of Ebay.

Paying no mind, of course, that she had decided to pick one of the most pricey forms of doll collecting ever conceived..

Or that she had ordered this last one from Japan..or that, say... was today when the rent was due?

"Heisler? Rachel Heisler?" Came the uneasy dull tones of the UPS man.

He was undoubtedly new and had the unrenown pleasure of delivering packages to the same address three times in one week, rather that treating it as a subject of half hearted amusement or asking what each contained as her usual mail person often did.

Rachel got the distinct impression that he merely detested the tiny bit of space each shipment took up in his van for all of an hour.

"Yes, that's me." She replied flatly, reaching out with equal distaste to sign the electric pad offered to her by the man who could not be bothered to remember her name and scribbled upon it with a fresh hurried scrawl which even the neatest name becomes when laid to such a device.

She zipped indoors with the parcel, nearly colliding ankle to paws with the inquisitive grey tabby cat who had been sitting just moments before with her front paws resting upon the unopened door.

She mewed indignity, as if her owner had just committed an unspeakable sin for not acknowledging her all mighty existence for a mere moment.

" It's here Demeter, it's here!"

Rachel chimed, the slight bounce in her step seeming to make her appear taller than her petite frame of five two, if only by energy level that filled up the whole tiny enclosure.

The girl grinned, making a b-line for her sofa which, being positioned right by the door, was normally a quite easy task.

As fate would have it thought the young twenty two year old woman had just a few days ago recovered from one of her 'fits' as she called them so fondly. This included among the day to day crisis of school work, several ' What in the world am I doing with my life?' Moments, and a heavy bout with clinical depression that came and went as it saw fit, leaving her sometimes unwilling to even take a shower when she happened to be confronted with certain subjects.

As it was , her apartment had still not recovered: Filled with an odd assortment of soda bottles and graded papers that graced the floor like the confetti of a low cost ticker tape parade, they mixed fondly with a pile of clean clothing that had not as yet made its way to being folded and placed into its rightful place in drawers and that now down spilled halfway onto the floor.

"Now..then!" Rachel said, helping the pile of clothing along on the floor to give herself a place to sit and holding a pair of scissors in a business like manner.

Her cat jumped up at her side, rubbing her cheek against a corner of the box as though to lay claim to it already.

Five mintents later, after wrestling with one too many layers of tap,e the top flap was free.

The open box was a sea of packing peanuts that the adventurous tabby nearly flung herself into before she was stopped by a disproving hand. The other was already fishing greedy among the sea of water solvable white foam pieces only to come out moments later with an unusual prize.

To say it was odd to what the average modern day viewer thinks of as art was an understatement.

A creature with eyes made of clear cut glass, at times shining a robins egg blue and at others a pure golden amber, the porcelain figure was indeed a cat.

But while every cat ever seen in reality had a

habit of walking about on all fours, this one stood proud and stance as any man, dressed in an all white suit and holding a cane in a very gentleman like fashion.

Even his white top hat gave his orange and yellow patterned face the very air of one who looked well respected.

Respected by whom?

To Rachel, lost in the awe of getting a brand new 'toy' it was the best $40 American dollars she could ever remember spending.

"Nice to meet you." She said with the polite air of someone that had long ago disconcerted herself with how silly talking to items of her collection when she was alone was.

Much more sanity in the long run she figured, than all the therapy acquiring an actual human roommate would ever cause.

Rachel lifted the figure gingerly from the box, carrying it with one swift flowing movement towards her bedroom and promptly tripping over her discarded backpack.

Mumbling, but sighing with thankfulness to find her newest possession unharmed, she continued her short path.

The bedroom, like its adjoining bathroom and front room (which served as both a kitchen and living space) was small.

Framed pictures and hand me down prints of a far off county side acquired from the girls family adored the walls, with one such space taken up by a sizable poster broad, filled with scribbled post it notes and reminders held together by a few overworked tacks.

The computer that took up residence on the west wall, sidelong from her bed, was cramped but cozy and showed all the markings of a well loved human abode.

Above the computer, in a place just out of reach of cat leap distance was a shelf of honor: porcelain dolls of all small matter and fashion abounded. Ladies with perfectly painted faces and gentlemen with elegant tailcoats, a waterfall of prim lace and painted oval eyes.

Here, a boy in little lord foundry dress, and there, a humanoid cat not unlike the new arrival, but visibly made with far less skill, in her Sunday best shepherding her three kittens to some unknown destination.

Rachel climbed up to reach the level of the shelf, a tricky maneuver that required a delicate balancing act between having one foot on her office chair and the other perched perilously on the surface of the upper computer desk.

Her freckled nose wrinkled a little with effort of withstand the position but she smiled, placing the cat man gently on the self.

" Lady Annabel..." She spoke in a guff introductory voice, "Meet Lord..Lord..Hm, what should I name you?"

She pondered, turning the figure so his eyes reflected the late afternoon sun.

A crashing sound not unlike the thunder of cardboard reached her ears just then, followed by the melody of a waterfall of sirfoarm and a pitiful startled sounding 'Mrew?'

"Oh, honesty kitty.." She said after nearly losing her balance and heading off to see what was the matter.

The cat had managed to somehow toss the box across the floor in her play, spewing the little pieces of foam like a man made snow storm upon the carpet...

Scooping up the mini landslide her figures came across an odd object: A tag, no unlike the one

often seen at yard sales, yellowed with age. It's surface was covered with lines of small print, some neatly written, others hurriedly scribbled in all different languages. Rachael picked out the line of Germain right away, followed by Russian and Chinese. The newest entry looked to be Japanese,

written in neat blue ink..

One of the oldest lines caught her eye last, inscribed in light cursive penciled English that she had to squint to make out...

"Baron Humbert Von Jikkingen." She read to herself softly, finding the name took full effect if spoken with the light Germain accent she remembered her grandmother having.

" If ever you

need help, or are troubled by something mysterious, or have a problem that's hard to solve, there is a place you can go, a place were..."

She glanced around for the rest, turning the card over.

"Hm, that's a weird thing to write with something like this..." She pondered walking back into

her bedroom absentmindedly.

Could it be a trick? She wondered No, who would go though so much trouble for something like this? Maybe it was an old superstition she had never heard of...

The thought of just now acquiring the international form of a ' E-mail this to twenty people you know or you will have bad luck forever.'

In the façade of a cat man was more than enough to make anyone uneasy.

But no, he just didn't look like that type of crudely made voodoo doll.

Then what?

She did not have to wait long to find out the answer.

"There is a place you can go. A place where I am sure to reside." Came a voice, deep and undoubtedly male.

Rachel looked up, only to be blinded by a flash of light. The blaze flashed a neon white to rival the sun, like the reflective surface of a dewdrop placed at the viewing end of a kaleidoscope.

When it died down she gasped.

The cat was dusting himself off.

It was such a matter of fact act, the feline like face cocked downward to survey the imperfections on his long white tail coat.

Looking closer, she could even make out the texture of the fabric it was now seemed to be made of, and the tiny copper buttons that fastened his waistcoat which shined like newly minted pennies.

Upon every inch of the once porcelain skin was fur, real ginger fur of varied tones and highlights

that moved with the natural flow of miniature muscle and bones hidden somewhere beneath it.

Whiskers even moved with the creatures natural breath.

Rachel's own breath caught in her throat as the newly animated Baron's eyes came up to meet her own, with a quite fire that only animals far removed from humans could ever seem to pull off fully.

The once flat copper eyes now seemed deep and timeless pools of quiet reflection and knowledge.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss...?" He half bowed, bending halfway at the waist tentatively.

Rachel brushed the unruly forelock of her light hair back once more.

There was something just so very wrong with this picture.

Is this it then? She pondered Have I really gone off the deep end? Could a deadline and the finals paper due for my latest class toward my English major do that to a person?

She thought back to her editors last words about dropping her if she dared miss another cut off date, of the thousands and thousands of words she had yet to add to her latest thesis.

Suddenly, talking to a forty dollar Germain made creation with a well rounded set of manners did not sound like too heavy a price compared to the normal world.

" Rachael..Um, Mr. Baron Von Jikkingen...?"

" Rachel." He spoke with consideration, as though putting a title to a new investment, " Please, if

you would be so kind, addressing me as simply Baron will do. I've found my over names more a waste of valuable time and pronunciation to even my friends."

 _My, but my hallucinations where well groomed now a days_ she mused.

"Okay, Baron...Am I crazy? Where just a (pardon me for saying) doll a moment ago right..and

you did just get shipped from all the way in Japan right? And..."

She stopped to glance at the grey striped puff ball of a cross between frightened shock and fury that had once been here cat, curled up now atop her computers left speaker.

The fur running down the spine in her back was half raised like a mini gelled mohawk and her tail, usually of the short haired persuasion now resembled a black bottle cleaning brush.

"What on earth have you done to my cat?"

"Yes, so sorry, my kind does have that effect on you're Earth kingdom cats. It truly has not been

the same since the Great War."

Yay, my delusional episode has history stories to boot! She remarked wordlessly

" But you can be quite sure you have not gone insane. You see, objects made with the deep love

of their creator like myself are of a special type. We of all human creations are the few which have souls. My mission is to help anyone in need that falls under certain conditions. And you my dear certainly need help."

"Help? I don't need..." She said, folding her arms defiantly

"If you did not, I would not be here."

Rachel huffed up at the tiny form of the Baron. What did he know of her troubles?

"You are a writer I presume?" He asked

"How did you know..?"

She stopped short, the title of 'writer' stinging some long forgotten emotional wound.

She had been seventeen, her words and force of will to get the fantasy land contained within her

head out on paper was nearly a force of nature in of itself, a reason for being. Her school grades

suffered from the incurable illness of story notes in assignment margins...A loner and geeky

outcast from her peers the was long whispered about in passing, she never let it reach her realm of thought.

All that mattered was the story, like a fruit of unspoken hope that grew in her heart.

When the notice that she had placed a formidable second in The Young Writers Association Annual fiction contest it was a moment of pure unsurpassed joy.

An agent to buy 2nd print rights followed soon after, and a series of five short stories to various magazines were born hot on its heels in her first years of college...

And...now? The writer's block or whatever it could be called had taken up what felt like a permanent place in her mind right between self-loathing and bitterness.

She was normally a happy person, or so she liked to think, but the lack of writing a single fictional work in the last year had eaten an acid like hole of guilt

in her stomach.

The familiar lacking sent a well of unpleasantness though her throat.

"I know the type." Baron said, leaping down gracefully from the self with a sound that resembled a low purring growl.

The sound of a dejected tabby exiting the room was a dim whisper upon

Rachael's far away and long ago thoughts.

"You have a tendency to not be the neatest of persons."

"Oh, so you're an expert?" She said sarcastically , flopping down upon her bed dramatically, and hanging her head over the bedside in a manner that always helped her think, her long hair tailing like waterfall.

There was no way this was real..it was just too convenient..and there was no need to be nice to an illusion who was talking down to her.

"Of a sort..."

"So what is this great miracle you can make come true Baron? With a wave of you've magic wand?" She waved her hands about in a large sweeping motion.

The cat man's ears twitched ever so slightly at her tone.

"No, you see...this will be a joint effort of constable energy..You see, to solve you're trouble you must write a story...for me..."

"Oh?" She said with half invented boredom.

"That is, my story." He added, leaning upon his cane lightly, skimming the computers surface with distaste and similar lightness.

Rachael couldn't help half giggling now, her turning over on her side causing a handful of throw pillows to tumble off the mattress.

It was a small understatement to say she had always had an interest with old things. Hours of her childhood had been long filled with hunting up in dusty attics adults had long forgotten they even had, in weathered books bounded with the begotten leather humankind had once created.

Making up far flung tales of a starry eyed lady who found she was really a princess raised by wicked parents that never let her had ice cream before dinner over an old silver spoon or the trunk of old costume jewelry that had once belonged to a witch.

Hours and hour spent building worlds within her imagination from common nicknacks...

And now one was asking her to write its...his, story! The ivory was not lost on her mind at all.

"You want me to write your story?"

"That is right." He replied, obviously use to having to wait long periods of time for others to comprehend what he was talking about.

"Well, you seem intelligent and everything, why not write your story yourself? I hear cat biographies are selling well these days."

"Even if I wished to I could not. You see, although I posse a soul it is against many higher laws that anyone but a true human may pen the tale of a creation...To go against that law would bring about disaster."

"Hmph, well, why not have a professional best selling author write it for you? They could write something a thousand times better than I could..I'm just a talent less one shoot wonder..."

"But you are the one who requires my help Rachel...Talent or not, fame or not, it is you who must do this for me..."

His words, half declaration, half request, sounding so very human, they brought a slight rosiness to her cheeks that died down a second later. What was she thinking?

"No!" She said firmly, slowly building a slit nest of blankets around herself with her nervous fingers as she spoke.

"Pardon?" Baron replied, cocking a brow

"No, sorry, I won't help you.." She added

"Is that so?"

"Y..Yes it is so. You'll just have to find someone else to write it."

There, that was showing him!

"Well, in that case I will have to be leaving here sometime tomorrow.." He said carelessly "So sorry to have wasted any of you're time on this foolishness."

 _Yes, I'm winning, fight that inner demon..._

"Yeah, maybe you will be able to get that one lady who writes vampire romance novels to do something for you, I hear she's quite good and she lives right in town here.."

"Perhaps I will look into that..." He said plainly with another bow.

"Well, good night then!" She yawned a bit too loudly, drawing a comforter up over her head like a fabric cocoon.

The muffled sound of small boots landing atop the outside of a mental rimmed wall clock met her ears.

"It is only eight o' clock..."

"Well, you know, I have to go to class early tomorrow and then go to work, and the wash and the dishes...Busy day tomorrow, yep, a nice normal busy day..."

"I see.."

Rachel prayed that the one thing the cat, or whatever he might be, did not see was a calender, a telltale sign that marked tomorrow as a very uneventful and lazy Sunday.


	2. Whisper Of The Heart In Which a Gem is Entrusted

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter 2 : In Which a Gem of Great Value is Entrusted, and There is a Leap Of Faith**

  
**Chapter 2 : In Which a Gem of Great Value is Entrusted, and There is a Leap Of Faith**   


_Sandpaper kisses_

 _A cuddle and a purr._

 _I have an alarm clock_

 _That's covered in fur!_

Rachael was having a interesting debate with a door mouse on international affairs and the

price of cheddar in India. She was about to remark that what the earth truly needed was more

goats milk and bring about world peace when her ears registered a loud 'clink' not unlike the

some of the dropping of a peanut size bowling ball upon a wall of glass.

The girl stood bolt upright, the warm security of her nest of comforters parting like the fabric

petals of a man made flower. She yawned deeply rubbing her eyes. Her body still held within

it the stiff awkward feeling that came from sleeping fulling clothed. She reached sleepily for

where the underwire of her bra had been surely working itself deeper into her tender lower chest.

With her green eyes still only open a faction of the way, sleepy hands reaching slowly to pull her

shirt up over her head she suddenly froze upon hearing another unmistakable 'click'.

Hastily, reluctantly, groggily, she pulled her shirt back downward.

"You're still here aren't you?"

Click.

Rachael let out a weak groan, falling over on her side in a sign of defeat that could only come

with a certain form of oversleeping.

For her just now clearing vantage point she beheld quite a sight:

The miniature building that had been constructed while she was sleeping from three or so packs of

cards that had been lying around was a work of art in its own right, there was even a single room

within the structure of grinning kings and diamonds in which sat the cat. He had surely made

himself at home, using a makeshift table out of a clear plastic drink coaster upon which now sat

a doll house size teapot and two cups.

"Drink. It will make you feel better." He said simply, his voice showing no sign of anger over

issues from the previous day.

"Mm..." Rachel complied, nearly oozing the short distantice to her computer chair.

She cast a cautious eye at the amber liquid within the tiny dime size cup. Had he bought this

with him from Japan? Sruging, she picked up the vessel gingerly between her thumb and

forefinger and sipped.

"It is my own special blend. It's a little different each time I make it so I can not judge for its

quality."

The girl gagged a bit, her nose wrinkling slightly between sleep puffed eyes.

"It's bitter!"

"Then today you are not very fortunate."

"That's for certain..." She agreed putting down the small nick nat to attend to the haystack that

had hours before been her hair in the small mirror on the opposite wall. Looking over her

shoulder she glanced the sight of her own cat now leaping up to sit beside the Baron, her grey

body dwarfing his own, and laying down, tucking her paws under herself contently.

"I see you and Demeter made up."

"Yes, well, we came to some agreement." He said, putting his hand upon her muzzle and getting

a purred 'mew' in return.

Rachel sighed, something she found herself doing far too much of lately.

"Well, if my cat trusts you I guess there is no reason I can't to..At least I have the vote of

confidence that she can see you to..."

Baron sipped his tea wordlessly.

"All right, all right !..I'll do it...I'll write your silly story."

He smiled, that is if you could call a very slight upturning of whiskers a smile.

"Just tell me one thing.."

"Yes?"

She pointed a hand in the grey tabbies general backward direction.

"She isn't going to start talking to me now right?"

"No, of course not..."

 _Good, because I draw the line at one break down from speaking normally non-speaking ententes_

 _to one a year_ she added to herself.

She was surprised when the cat made no farther inquires and let her take her sweet time getting

ready for the day. Even as she showered and dressed in fresh clean jeans she knew that he must

be perched somewhere around the closed doors knob. He had quite a nice voice for someone only

seven inches tall she mused.

"So, you have had many owners before?"

"Yes, this is my third time in America..."

"I wondered why you didn't speak Japanese."

"Some languages are far more universal than simple human."

Rachel opened the door, now fully clothed again in an oversized t-shirt dedicated to a long

forgotten radio station and a tried and true worn out pair of jeans, drying her blonde hair with a

fluffy red towel that looked to have seen better days in the wash.

The baron landed with soundless leap atop the mountain of the desk again.

"So..may I ask...Why has no one written your story before? If it is so important I mean..."

"Many have tried..." He said, skipping back on his tail coat and adjusting his cufflinks "But none

have ever managed to make it though to the stories end. I blame no one, my story is difficult to

grasp..Always the same out in the world of its making, but hard to experience..."

"Experience? You mean hard to do justice to right? I told you that a accomplished writer would be

better..."

"No, I mean to live though Rachel."

"Live though? What, are you going to ask me to write one thousand six hundred something words

a day or put me on a one month deadline?"

"No, I am no slave driver. You only need to take my hand and trust..."

Rachel ran her fingers over her keyboard, a gesture that was like shaking hands with a long time

friend and stopped. There it was again, that same half formed indescribable look that the Baron had

given her yesterday when first asking for help. She wondered if he was even aware of it. His face

was so hard to read, so reined in that she could not be sure.

Was it safe to dive into this odd project that he had offered. It seemed too good to be true, write a

story that had many times been halfway, maybe nearly competently written by following the cats

diction? Being a ghost writer had never caught her interest but this was such an odd case..The

lure to follow his lead just to see what ideas he had in mind was like being drawn in by the world

biggest chocolate dipped managspritpt flavored desert. Plus, it wasn't as if her day was very

packed with wall to wall activity, at least, none that she could think up on such short notice (darn

it all).

"Okay, I'll bite. How long will this take do you think?"

" In your time, a day."

" A day!" She started, visions of being ball and chained to her computer like a literary

prisoner running though her head.

"But time goes by far slower than that in my realm. You could easily be there

for trity years and be back before anyone misses you at brunch. Time is both faster and slower

there as it fancies, but you will be fine none the less."

"O..okay..but what on Earth does holding your hand have to do with typing your story?"

"It has nothing to do with anything on Earth..."

His voice, it was so different all of a sudden, no longer did it have that overlound, have wooden

edge but it seemed so real...

Ages seemed to past before ether one moved.

Any average passer by that had happened to look into the window of the very much unspoken

apartment would have only however seen a woman in her early twenties, reaching out with one

considering hand to perhaps dust a newly acquired very realistic looking cat doll, which typing at a

snails pace absent mindly with the other.

"What is the story called...?" She breathed

"You will know." The Baron said

And suddenly, she did...It was like someone else was typing...Four simple words upon the pure

snow whiteness of the lonely page: Whisper of the Heart.

The world was a dream, a blurry mixture of the sweet unbroken poetry of color. Around her head

swam the ordinary world, melting back into its dull cave of normally like a wounded wolf after

the hunt. The worlds heavy bearn seemed to lift off her shoulders, to be replaced by a quite claim

like fallen snow. Pure. White. Beginning...green...grass?

Rachel blinked, the reflection of sunlight upon the grass turning her eyes a yet deeper of their

emerald. Carpet, surely, was not made of wild wheat.

The brown lace up boots that she now wore with silk stockings were most definitely not her worn

white socks and battered tennis shoes. She broke out of her sleep like trance , whirling in the lite

red dress she now found herself in: It's full skirt contained a ruffle around the the bottom realm

and scooped neck, and upon peering behind she saw the waist was secured with a flowing

ribbon, underneath layers and layers of petticoats and a pair of bloomers to acopany their

whiteness. She was whirling again and taking in the puffed long sleeves that so reminded it her of

the many dolls in her collection when a first glance at the world around her made her fall short.

The sky and the baron. It was hard to tell what to take in first without surcoming to the whole

scene.

The cliff they stood upon was actually a huge rounded ended pillar, that looked to be nearly 12

feet and with and countless miles long to where the greenery covered surface dropped into what

looked like a sunlight slashed meadow eons below. The sky was just as deep and rimmed with

sun, bellowing clouds surrounding similar pillars like they had once supported a god size version of

tinker toys. Large rocks layered with similar foliage hung about in the air nearby, nearly the width

and depth of two city blocks as if defying gravity just for their own sake with splashes of

water colored blooms.

The Baron was most definitely not a doll anymore, in appearance or height. In fact, while she recalled

him being only fourteen or so inches tall, his imposing frame now dwarfed her own by five. Rachel

had always hated being called 'petite' and now she found that she was again slightly saddled with

at label.

Looking into the cats cool eyes however she felt an odd sort of claim, clothed in fabric that

looked to be from his own era.

He rested his top hat solely on his chest, as if greeting her own more for the first time.

"Let us go forth together... in search of the treasure of lapis lazuli!"

She could only nod at this brave over dramatic statement. It was just the thing she would have

suspected a hero to say upon beginning a long journey...

Wait? Was he the hero? Was she really writing this?

But if I am the one writing this how can I be here now? How am I here at all? She shared down at

her obviously not typing fingers and caught sight of a purse she had not noticed before across her

left

shoulder. Opening it, she beheld all the assortment of things that had once been in her jean

pockets: A few dollar bills, some candy, her tiny Ipod shuffle, a single silver earring...

What have I got myself into?

"How did you get so big?"

"I did not grow Rachel, you only have grown smaller. It is the way of this place..."

She took in a sharp breath as a sudden gust of wind whipped up around her face, laying

pieces of grass on her freckled cheeks.

"Have no fear. Space is deformed here on this, which will be the night of the new moon. Farway

things loom large, and nearby things look small."

Rachel had only a moment to consider who was now writing the cat's dialogue before he grabbed

her hand and gestured toward the sky around them.

"Now, to began we must take flight! We will rise on the updraft."

"Are you joking?" She meeped, taking a cautious step forward and on gut instinct doubling back.

The country side was so far below that the few cottages that could be picked out (if one could

even call them that) were like the fine abodes of dust mites.

She pictured her body making a lovely scarlet colored smear of flesh and bone to ruin the scene

in a very effective way.

"Make haste, the planetoids converge!" Baron called out, glancing behind them.

The girl had only a moment to shout out the smallness of our obscenities before the two of the comet like spheres did began to crash in around their tiny spot.

On gut instinct she turned about and closed her eyes, taking a clumsy if energetic leap off into space with both polished boots.

There are many things that go though one's mind as they are free falling down to certain doom

Rachel discovered. The first is this such fascination with wanting to see the Earth below. She

wrestled with this feeling suddenly, playing tug a war with the wind taking great delight with

trying to blow her dress up over her face, when she at last manage to wrench it down again

between her legs. The next was how slow the pasting of time seemed to grow, holding its breath

as the two hung in the air, falling and yet seeming to remand like a reluctant fall leaf.

And then with a sudden soundless roar that left any scream she had building up to die in her throat

the updraft did indeed come. Like a wall of invisible force moving ever forward from whence they

came, it picked up the weathered looking girl and dapper cat cradling them under their feet.

Rachel opened her eyes again, but was reluctant to withdraw her hand yet from the Barons' own,

as if some mighty magic might be upset.

"We're flying! We're really flying!" She yelled over the wind's whip.

"Not flying so much as riding, but it is fun isn't it?" He remarked " Nowhere else in the Many

Kingdoms will you find such levitating magic. It is good we caught the updraft on such a favorable

day. Some months it only allows pig this pleasure. But those are very rare. "

Rachel's nose crinkled in amusement, the experience making her feel far more light hearted than

she had been in years.

"You will find many of you're world's sayings are born here, flying pigs being no exception."

"So.." She said, rearranging her dress in a more favorable flying position " What is this lapis lazuli

treasure you say we are going on a journey for? I've heard of the birthstone..it's for December if I

remember right...and..blue?"

"Yes, but stones here you will find hold far more power than any of the same you would see

back home Rachel. Even the most common of quartz in this realm are a rare wizards tool, or

weapon. Lapis lazuli is the most valued and rare of them all for various reasons...Lucky for us, we

possess the Cat King's most valued tool to find it.."

He pointed toward her purse.

"Valued..tool...?" She reached inside the pack once again, coming upon an oddly shaped object

she could have sworn had not been there before, and pulled it out.

The large red ruby, the size of the width of her palm but surprisingly lite glittered in the sunshine.

She took in the fine detailing around it's rim of two elegant slim Siamese silhouetted cats cast in

gold and the small linked chain on which it was stung carefully.

It doesn't look magical. She pondered

"Wear it always." He motioned with his free hand and Rachel with a quick nod looped the

necklace over her laced high collar and under her short ponytail "...and never let anyone know

you possess it, that gem is worth more than a live times amount of gold."

The girl nodded again, repositioning the jewel part of the necklace so it was tucked securely

within her upper under-coverings in a place which barred any but the most death seeking thieves.

"Now," He continued " We must go straight to to that castle atop that peak, to be allowed entry to

the kingdoms within..."

Rachel pulled back her ever rebellious wisp of hair and gazed: The castle was just now becoming

visible within a nestled group of mossy pillars that lorded over the horizons landscape. It's walls

were all of blue brick and red titled roofs graced ever tower, an eagle making a lazy afternoon

flight over its topmost structure before roosting after a successful hunt.

"It's so high up..." She commented, nearly afraid of the dazzling height "We'll never make it..."

In all her life Rachel had never heard a cat laugh. Official sources once seemed to claim that

purring was the feline form of this human gesture, until they discovered it present among even

cats in pain. No, this joyful noise was more than a purr and an edge above the human form that

the Baron's hands suggested, leaping up to greet the cheerfulness of merely being alive.

"It's not so high once you're there..."

The airway that had been holding them steadily forward

flared suddenly upward, mirroring the suddenly excited gilt in the Baron's eyes and the fear and

excitement in her own.

"When the air currents mingle in the afternoon, you can touch the stars!"

And for that brief moment, soaring upward ever upward with no time to think or worry about the

least thing Rachel honestly beveled that she could soar into the heavens.

When the wind at last gently deposited them atop the pillar , Rachel's legs gave out beneath her,

unused to the sudden solid surface of the earth.

Like a child she looked up at the huge wooden door before her, whose owners, if going by appearance alone, when be far less wondrous and enduring than a flight atop the wind.


	3. Whisper Of The Heart In which Cat Meets Rat

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tourism was dead.

Tourism was dead.

It was not the kind of dead that one could easily fix though relocation or flasher advertising. In

fact if anything was working against drawing in more visitors from the west it was the

Spiderdale Castle. Other parts of the land that protected the inner Kingdoms were friendly and

hospitable, nearly falling all other themselves in offerings of free assorted cookies and the

occasional mug of Blackberry ale. But Spiderdale Castle, the long sentry atop the pillars that

separated the Human dimension of the Earth from The Kingdoms was vastly different, and as

such had fallen into social disrepair. Even the most unfeeling of creatures would stop to think on

lazy days of what ever the human beings could have done to deserve such a unfavorable

welcome..and then add shortly after that it served them right. After all, who in their right mind

liked the smelly things?

  
**Chapter 3: In which Cat Meets Rat, and The Journey is Begun**   


The Baron had hoped he would never become accustomed to coming to this area. Even now, meerly

lingering outside the giant drawbridge as the human girl gasped in astonishment he did not relish

what was awaiting them. The once grand towers that had shone with life year ago had long fallen

into disgrace. Holes in the caved in detailed roofs hung with a a tapestry of spiderwebs that

seemed to soak up any light and file it away from its domain on n like a living creature.

The stone and morder a of the castle body was half swallowed alive by vast quantities of moss, brown and wilted from lack of rain even this close to the clouds.

The Baron stole a glance at the human once before stepping forward.

As human went she was easy to look at, with pale hair and a similar complexion.

He marveled at how well the same dress looked on even the paleness of females.

Perhaps it was only the appeal of the style upon his thoughts, or the fact that the same matter of dress

was worn by only the nobles of his land.

He swiftly decided to block out the wave of memory that it invoked, a land of bright and elegant

jewel walled, flowered dress and smartly attired travelers, their ears pricked happily, and tails playfully

twitching to the music of steert corner minstrels playing endless lines of vilon and flute to

welcome the new year.

But was this girl truly up to the task? He had known so many different girls that had taken upon

this task. The plot was always the same written on half soulful pages. How could he possibly describe

to her that right this moment her body was somewhere long removed from here trapped

in the spell that had been cast on him years before for dragging others into the line of the curse that

bound his freedom.

The same story, yes, it was always the same, written in bits and pieces but

somehow no one never arrange them in the correct order.

How could they?

The story was one that only one other soul in all the dimensions knew the ending and they were long dead

along with his home land.

And so his soul was entrapped in his own life, reliving it only to give empowerment to

the varied writers around the world.

They sang his praises and then promptly out grew the ability to hear his voice, leaving him to to collect dust on a shelf,

once again voiceless.

But still he did not give up hope, not as long as he remained living again by the power of this girls imagination.

He quickly pulled himself from his thoughts as he had often become very good at doing.

Reaching out , he tapped his polished hard wood cane musically upon the base of the drawbridge

there was a sudden cloud of dust the blowed up from around its rim and something that sounded

remarkably like a cough. Slowly tiny pin points of light gathered from some unseen location

inside the structure or swirling faster and faster around the doors shell.

"Quick! Out of the way!" He shouted, scooping the awestruck girl up in his arms and making a leap

to side.

The drawbridge did not come down neatly and snail like as any reasonable door, but all at once

and flatly like an antique oak being cleared in a trash and burn clearing.

Baron placed her down again and had to reach out to keep his clumsy charge, half frozen from the

sudden event, from falling off the edge they had come to rest on.

"We...have to go in there...don't we?" She asked "Isn't there some rule about only having happy

castles at the beginning of stories..? You know: with singing princesses and happy bluebirds and

sewing mice and... W, a spider!" She concluded, stomping on the offending arachnid without

much thought as they began their way down the hallway.

It smelled of musky long forgotten linens left indoors to rot and the trick layer of dust and dried

leaves on the floor blocked the view of the once fine red

carpet. It depicted a scene all of the Kingdoms knew well in their tales: The sun goddess

scattering fish down from the heavens, while a hunting party of cat's on horseback waited

below in wonder, the First Cat King in his glistening armor, standing up high on his majestic

mount to fetch the offerings directly from her paw...

Her meek side is as well produced as her humor he remarked. My but I do pick the odd ones, I

must think about braking than habit.

"Yes we must..Most unfortunate I know. With any luck we should be able to pass with little

chance of..."

"Chance of what what what, Von Jikkingen?" A sudden voice interjected coming from nowhere

and yet everywhere resounding in the hollow chamber. The Baron whirled around instinctively,

blocking the girl at his side.

"Chance of not meeting me? That's very, very, very, unkind of you boy."

"Who are you?" Rachael shouted, her tone suggesting she wasn't too interested in finding out and

would rather whatever it was would kindly melt back into the shadows.

Baron braced himself, but found that he was still after all these years unprepared for it. The smell.

He thanked the Gods that at least the girl with her weak human nose was saved the true depth of

the scent. Cats noses however were sparred nothing of the details, with a sense of smell that

rivaled in close second even the best dog.

It smelled of rotten flesh and eggs and the decomposing body of grains that had somehow mixed

themselves into a near alcoholic concoction.

The same spots of light began to glitter brightly on the walls glowing brighter as they grew from

the consuction, in a doorway that was filled with darkness. The word 'fireflies' died in the girls

throat as soon it was mouthed. The figure that approached could only kindly be described as grotesque:

Clothed in multicolored rags that looked like they had been dragged out of dumpsters the huge rats

fur was matted with unspeakable unidentifiable bits of filth. His muzzle, grayed with time jaunted

out from beneath large glassy black eyes.

He began speak again, thin lips parting to reveal two large dagger like teeth, yellowed and

chipped, his saliva having a deep green tint the drooled a bit over the ground beneath an ever

moving nose that his true nature was rightly marked as the scum of this plain.

"Jikkingen, I'm so very hurt hurt hurt by your disregard for this poor old man."

"Good afternoon Baladan, it's been a while."

"Oh, it's been far far too long, how long on the human side now? Nearly ten years since you

brought the last one? I hear she only got to chapter five, wrote bits of the ending and them got

lost in the harder school work of high school and forgot about you..."

Baladan paused and turned to Rachael with a sudden snap of his head , making her cringe just

inches from his raptly twitching nose as he assessed her cheerfully

"She's a bit older than your normal tag a long isn't she? How very very very interesting..She doesn't

smell like she is from Japan though..Where do you come from Missy? What's your nest mates living? "

"A..America...n..northern California...My family owns a ...vineyard..."

"Bah, I thought I smelled a mutt..Germain, Irish, Indian...You have got odd odd odd tastes my

boy..." the rat shrugged "But, who am I to judge? People say I have none at all!" He laughed ,

nearly going into and coughing fit.

"I"d thank you not to speak of her in such a fashion...That is surely not the reason we are here...

let us past in peace and we will not brother you any longer..."

"Oh please do do brother me! You do not know how very very very dull it gets here with only

the blasted lights for company!"

"W..What are the fireflies for?" Rachael mused as a tail of the tiny insects swooped lazily near

her head, giving the effect of being near a large low burning candle.

"Why, they are my slaves, my magic helpers, their lights will never burn out and they only die if

put in water, so they are so very very efficient to dig out my tunnels with you see..."

The rat batted at one of the insects halfheartedly and sent it reeling.

"Burns though any surface that isn't organic and all..Don't they teach you anything in those human schools of

your's?"

Rachael reached out toward the half battered fly that fell like a half drunk leaf into the palm of her

hand. It was shaped like a ladybug with metallic rainbow colored wings with dots that were actually

tiny holes in their surface allowing the yellowish gold of its whole body to peek though to the

surrounding darkness.

"All right then..." The rat guardian said solemnly. He stopped in their pace, coming to a very solid

looking brick wall, outfitted with a pulley made of discarded sand bags. The fireflies came out of

the walls in waves grabbing a hold of the rope. Slowly, carefully, they began to pull and the

corder was fulled with the noise of grinding stone on stone.

Bright crystal white light spilled into the space, and the rat hastily shaded his eyes turning away.

"Now, there is the matter of my payment Jikkingen..."

"Rachael.." He whispered "Something metal you carry, anything will do..."

Rachael reached deeper into the purse and came out with the earring.

Baladan scooped it up, his mouth curled in an impressed 'o' before biting it to make sure it was real and

sticking it in an unseen pocket.

"

That is nice...But I had something so so so much better in mind...she is very plain for one of

your's Jikky, but she will do nicely!"

"Not if I can help it, let go!" She struggled against the old rodents surprisingly tight grip. In her

wiggling the golden chain came lose from its hidden place, the stone catching the brilliant clear

light from the doorway.

"THE ALMLET! I will have it and you!"

The next moments pasted so quickly Rachael barely had time to react:

The Baron's body pressed in front of her, knocking her from the old ones grasp.

"Go, I will follow!"

The sound of the things claws against his cane was a sicking thing like the ring of metal against bone.

She could see the flash of a sword, that had somehow been concealed in its walking stick width.

"How will I find you again?"

"Go!" He prompted, edging toward the doorway pushed by the keepers strength and elbowing her on.

She nodded and took a deep breath, jumping head long into the mysterious realm beyond the

castle and into the unknown.


	4. Whisper Of The Heart In Which The Girl Is Alone

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The cat kingdom was on edge. Never since the day the cook had accidentally put raw salmon in

The cat kingdom was on edge. Never since the day the cook had accidentally put raw salmon in

the place of sole in the royal soup had the king thrown such a massive temper tantrum.

It had started early this morning and had now lasted well into the afternoon, preventing any of its citizens from taking their customary eight hour nap.

No one quite knew the reason for this disturbance outside of the court but that rarely saved the common folk from the onslaught of his fury.

Even the youngest of kittens had been sent out to find a certain piece of wardrobe in the hours they would much rather be romping in the grass.

It was one such kitten in fact, playing a game of bat tag in clear defiance of the official orders, that came across an odd creature in a red dress by tumbling on it in the middle of the western field ...

  
**Chapter 4: In Which The Girl Is Alone, and The King Is Suspecting**   


Rachel came to from the depths of nothingness with a feeling of a rather hard feather being patted again and again on the surface of her nose. She wrinkled it, reaching out a hand in that general direction and rolling over.

"Mm, just five more minutes Mom..." She croaked

The pats persisted, this time stronger and more impatient.

"Huh?" She said, finally opening her eyes and coming face to face with another set, wide and undoubtably feline eyes, and the black and pink pads of a paw right by her face.

The black and white kitten came up to just below her knees when she stood up from the very comfortable glass.

His appearance was a bit fancy:

Clothed all in a dark midnight blue velvet, a pair of small knickerbockers were buckled around his mid-hind legs, and although he wore no shoes, the long white socks that were present gave the impression he was not always without anything of the sort, as did the silver stripes woven on his sailor shirt collar.

"Are you a dog?" The young tom peeped, his voice defiant, a tell tale sign of a first rate question asker.

"No, of course not..." Rachel said, trying to make a clean get away, but being blocked once more by the kitten.

"You sure are big, not as big as Papa though..You could be a pug dog..pug dogs are smaller for

big dogs..."

"I'm not a pug!" She interjected, not sure what to make of him and starting to get a little angry as well.

"But your face is funny, you sure aren't a cat lady.." He looped around to her back side as she

walked, pulling up the back of her skirt and putting his head halfway under it before she gently

but forcefully kicked him away.

"You don't have a tail!" He gasped in amazement

"So I've noticed..Would you go away? I'm kind of busy being..um..lost."

"You're lost weird lady? Oh, then you should go see Grandpa..."

"Grandpa?"

"Yeah, my grandpa the Cat King...Only he's not in a very good mood lately, maybe you could try

getting lost next week and ask him where you are?"

"I don't have a week! At least, I don't think so...When I left the person I came with they were in

danger you see..."

"Oh, is that all?" The Kitten winked and grabbed her hand, " Then you should talk to my papa, he

can deal with any ol' danger. He's a war hero you know...What you never heard of the War of

The Greyhounds?" The kitten said in surprise to Rachel's blank look.

She shook her head.

"AH, you'll like the story! My name's Loki by the way...Ya see, there was this big howling

noise that started on Dalmatian Hill..."

Rachel had just been treated to the longest if sentences spoken without breathing she had ever

had the courtesy of hearing, the kitten still reaching up on tip paw to hold her hand as he lead her to a pathway in the back of the castle .

Everything from how well his father could handle a sword, to more than a bit of detail than he should know at his age, about why eating catnip on horseback while leading that charge at a regiment of greyhounds, is not a good idea.

Meanwhile, she gazed at the pasting countryside as she walked:

It was all covered in a breezie grassland of green cat tails and the cats themselves were scurrying about tending to everyday life.

Unlike Loki or the Baron they all walked quickly around without a stitch of clothing on their

backs, sometimes bending down from their back paws to greet each on all fours in a movement

that reminded her so much of her own cat back home.

Their houses were odd little dwellings dug halfway into the soil in round semi-circles that every

now and then blew small wisps of smoke for their chimneys. This, she thought, mirrored how fond her own cat was of sleeping in everything for round baskets to the occasional salad bowl.

He was just taking a breath to continue on when someone opened the towers back door.

It was obviously a female cat, she was dressed in a gown even fancier than the girls own, only all

white to match her short neatly brushed coat. Pearls and diamonds rimed the cat's head piece

collar, shaped in the outline of a heart. Her frame underneath it all looked fragile and small as if

the right wind might blow her off her back paws at any moment.

"Mama!" Loki chimed hopping up and down with enthusiasm "Mama, mama, looked what I

found, a funny dog!"

The female's blue eyes widened at catching sight of Rachel.

"Oh my goodness, oh dear..This is not good..That is not a dog Loki!" She gasped reaching out a

protective arm and showing her in before closing the door after a stray look behind them. "Come

in, come in... Loki, were did you find this human?"

"In the out fields Mama, where I was playing.."

"Playing? Oh, look, you've gotten your good socks all dirty again..."

"But Mama, you always said you playing in mud all the time when you were little.."

"That was in the human world Loki..You have more sense than to get dirty here..You represent

something to all the cats here, sometimes that not every cat is fortunate enough to have,

something I never had when I was your age and living off fish crackers..You must wear it with

pride."

"I'm sorry Mama..."

"No true harm done, just don't make such things a habit. We wouldn't want stories to start about

one of the princes running around in his socking feet all day would we? Go play with your

brothers and sisters Loki..."

"Okay.." Loki sighed vanishing into some unseen part of the castle with the sound of light paws

rings on stone the resounded for moments afterward.

"Children can be such trouble sometimes, I hope he was not rude to you..He does like to talk..."

"I had no idea." Rachel replied

"Forgive my own rudeness then..." The white cat said bowing

Rachel bowed back awkwardly, having observed that this practice was held as

common place in this place.

"My name is Yuki , crowned princess of this land. Are you by any chance a

friend of Haru's?"

"Sorry Your Majesty, I've never even heard that name before..."

"Oh.." The cat princess replied sadly "Well, she was only an old dear friend, I could not hope

that every human on earth knew each other personally on a first name basis..."

What followed was a long detailed account to the new female cat of the ordeal she had just been

though and where she came from (with the proper embellishments in the right places about her own actions) and how the Baron had dragged her from her warm bed and semi-organized life.

This was, of course, accompanied with a skipping of any details related to the jewel and Lapis Lasio. After the event withe the rat guardian she twitched at even the thought of telling anyone the mere name of the item.

She needn't have worried she'd find out.

The white cat listened intently and so quite that the girl was afraid she might be boring her.

N's ear twitched as Rachel's expiation came to a close.

"My..my..that is quite a lot you've seen. The Baron have quite a reputation here you will find here, not an entirely good one ether. But he is a good man." She smiled " One of those is his habit of befriending humans. I knew you must be here with him as soon as I saw you." She said warmly and then Rachel's face slowly raised to hers.

"That's why I'm so very sorry I have to turn you in to the King. Guards!" The cat yelled and

suddenly two huge black and white cats with grim faces and muscular bodies like the most

formidable of bouncers Rachel had ever seen burst into the room.

"Hey? What is this! Let go of me!" She retorted, struggling against the holds that were like steel up on her arms.

"I thought you were a friend of Baron's!" She shouted back at the cat's form.

"I was..." Came the weak reply from the princess before her dim outline vanished from Rachel's

limited range of vision as she was dragged off.

As odd as it seemed being forcefully pulled to be integrated by a king had its advantages. For one

thing Rachel considered, it was the prefect opportunity for a heavy dose of self pity, something that all the wonderment of the new world she had been tossed into had been blocking for the last few moments (or hours? Days? She couldn't really tell, this world seemed sadly, or fortunately, lacking when it came to clocks, or even hourglasses).

How did I get into this mess? Oh,yes, I asked for it.

She felt like banging her forehead against a desk or some similar hardwood by found none handy

in her half forcibly walking state.

 _But why did I think that the first other person, er, cat, I met would just welcome me with open arms?_

"Oh hi human, here have this easily placed rare gem that is the key to your whole quest thing with my blessings!"

 _Sheesh, yeah right._

The huge doors to the throne room were slowly parted.

The walls of the palace were breathtaking elegant with more than enough room to host even the

biggest dinner parties. As it was the whole room was fulled to the rim with overstuffed pillows

on the floor of ever shade detailed with embroidery and bead sewing.

The tapestries on the walls

were warm and detailed with faces of former kings and their historic rulings. Rachel

even picked out one tastelessly of a whole crowd of human solders bowing before a practically

smug looking siamese cat. Another depicted a cat woman sewing upon her embroidery a full array

of goldfish in bight gold shades. Around her feet lay a similarly large pile of fish bones and an

upturned round bowl with a thin layer of water that was supporting a last pitiful flopping koe gasping for breath in its (undoubtable) last moments. All this warmth of pallet was not mirrored

in one of the sole figured that graced the enclosure like a furry grey Persian oozing blob of over pampered power. He was dozing lightly, his heavy crown inset with a red gem titled slightly

over one side of his face like a weakened soldier at esse, the single front paw that encircled the pillow he sat on torn with tell tale gases from now only half retacted claws.

Rachel could tell in an moment that the cat before her was the Cat King, royalty of the highest order gave off a certain air of bitterness that was hard to misunderstand even from a non-human sense in the long run.

A small tan and chocolate brown cat with ears that made Rachel think fondly of the Scottish fold

breed of cat appeared suddenly from some sort of entry way hidden among the pillows.

"Um, Your Majesty?" He mewed

"Hm?" Came the deep reply

"Oh your majesty, a young human woman is present. She seeks an audience with you, mew."

"I seek audience with him? I just got dragged from...!" Rachel's loud whisper aimed at the

unsuspecting cat made him bristle as the gruads reached down to forcefully cover her mouth.

"Is that so Natoru ?"

"Oh, yes, meoew! She asked for you very specially, wouldn't stand for anything less...Roomer has it she hails from the West.." He ended his statement on a much softer tone.

The king's toadlike eyes snapped open then ablaze

"The west! The weeest? That is the human world entry way!"

Natoru mouthed the word 'bow' silently to her and did a curtseying motion.

Rachel remembered herself and was let loose for a mere moment to grasp both ends of her wide

dress and coursey in a pretty old fashion way, only to nearly end up falling down nose first for

putting one leg in front of the other and bending her knees slightly in the puffy under

garments and was hosted up again by her elbows by the guards.

"But of course my liege..."

"No human could come directly though the entry way of there own accord, certainly not alone! It

must be Von Jikkingen's doing..."

The crowd that had started to gather upon the start of the kings angered words let out a gasp and

ducked down out of sight, peering up at her cautiously.

"Tell me the truth there girl, do you know Von Jikkingen?"

Rachel's mind raced. What should she say? Did she dare lie? It really should not be any skin off

her nose about the Baron's fate..and yet..somehow...

"Who is that Your Majesty?" She asked quietly, politely, calmly..maybe a little too claim when

standing before a king.

"Von Jikkingen, the outcast Baron of Carmeadow, the cat who single pawed brought about the fall of

his land and committed terison against me, the King of Cats, the very father of his race!" The Cat

King finished dramatically, painting and falling back on his pillow as a swarm of servants rose up to comfort him after putting forth so much effort for the sake of a human.

Rachel considered once more, and a long silence filled the room.

Slowly, carefully, her green eyes rose up, the candle flame reflecting off them silently.

"No your Majesty, I've never heard of him."

The king spat out a long stream of the milk he had just been given on the nearby U, coughing and

shuddering.

"What! What? You are LYING! LYIIING!" He yelled, once regaining his voice.

"Sire, remember you're hairball pressure, you don't want another attack other this silly girl do

you, merw?" The fold said in a panic.

Rachel could not bring herself to lift her face once more and remained silent, the shouts ringing

in her ears.

Great, just great. Now I have to start acting all noble..Rachel you are a first class grade A idolt!

Her inner voice chirped as bright and full of energy as the Scottish fold.

"Well, that will be enough out of you female! Let us see how tight your lips remain when they

are unattached from your body at your beheading tomorrow morning!" Rachel winced a little at

the king's first statement and felt like throwing herself off the nearest bridge at the word

'beheading'.

"Your Majast..." She began , but was cut short by the guard once more, which she had a

sudden incurable notion to bite in defiance.

"Enough!" The king bellowed " Let that be a lesson to all who are present that may get every

now and then even the smallest thought, the smallest idea about taking side with the Baron should he ever darken our halls again with his mutantity against my kingdom...Yes, let her punishment...um..er.."

The Fold whispered sometime quickly in his ear must indiscreetly "er...yes... foreshadow what

your own may be..." He stressed, feeling the new word heavy upon his breath. "Take her away..."

The crowd of servent cats nodded and bowed, speaking all in unison something that sounded

like part of a prayer the Rachel could make out.

The guards took her tightly by the arms once again and then suddenly she did feel like acting on

her instructs, biting ones paw only to have it replaced by another (cupped in a much less chewable

angle) as she began to kick and wiggle with all her might, the hall doors closing behind

the three.

"Ahh! She bit me! The thing bit me!" One of the guards howled the second the king's throne room was out of earshot.

"Bad luck...You'd better put some ice and stuff on that or your fur will grow nasty for months.."

"Seriously?" The guard mumbled

"Oh sure, everyone knows human's carry the worst diseases you've ever seen..and their smell..Don't get me started, I mean do they even lick themselfs at all? It 'll take me months just clean myself up right after all the time we've spent next to this one!"

"Tell me about it." The other agreed

Rachel let out a wholehearted "HMGH?" in her species defense.


	5. Whisper Of The Heart In Which There Is A Discovery

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Baladan hated cats. It was not one of those pasting half baked hates that one held on to since nesthood, but a wicked wild thing that had consumed the better part of his reason.

Baladan hated cats. It was not one of those pasting half baked hates that one held on to since nesthood, but a wicked wild thing that had consumed the better part of his reason.

All of his reason, save that of his devotion to the old traditions one of which was lower class showing of respect to all noble persons, weather they be cat or mouse, fish or dog.  
It was a long standing belief he cursed silently every time he was forced to cross paths again with this Baron von Jikkingen.

Every time it seemed the Baron's line of human girls grew more odd indeed and his actions less and less befitting a gentleman and more of a cat hunting one of his ancestors long past.

He was panting now, still holding his ground lightly but only barely.

His mouth was running with beaten breath. The cat broke their stalemate , knocking the rodent at last to the ground and  
sliding his sword back into its cane sheath with an elegant flare.

"You are old, my dear Baladan." The cat spoke "It is really a shame, for I know how much you wish to fight.  
You are very proud, but I will not come down to fighting those who are weaker than me."

"Until we meet again then." The rat breathed bitterly

"Yes, Until then." The cat replied, and without so much as another word leaped with a soundless  
back-flip into the brunet light of the dimension arch.

  
**Chapter 5: In Which There Is A Discovery, and New Alliances Are Formed**   


There are certain things that go though ones mind as they are locked in a dudgeon for many hours.  
Depending on the seriousness of their crime their thoughts are everything from self pity flavored  
to the deepness level of the well of boredom.

With nothing to look at of any interest the mind autonomically turns inward and wonders about happier times and places far removed from their dark tower of despair.

Rachel's own mind was somewhere far away, tucked up against the small tower cells wall with her knees drawn up to her stomach, the dim light of the moon falling  
on her form with the sale indifference nature was so fond of giving. __

I wonder if anyone remembered to feed my cat... She pondered, picturing a sad pleading furry  
face before an equally sad looking empty bowl. __

I have an essay due tomorrow..I wonder if Mr. L will take me being beheaded as an excuse? _..He'll probability say no if my hands can still twitch in the right convolutions..  
._ She sighed and stared at the wall.

It was a very nice wall as walls go, with stone of a grey and brown shade and white  
modern in all the right places, but it did very little in entertainment value...

That was until she made out a faint glow coming from somewhere beside her. Reached puzzled in that direction, she found her purse again,  
with a half hidden glowing something or other fighting against its closed flap with all its might...She opened it to find...One of that rats firefly slaves!

"Well, well, where did you come from you little stow away?" She asked cheerfully, it's sudden  
appearance doing wonders for her mood.

The little bug zipped and twitched in a playful way around her head wordlessly in reply...And suddenly something else glowed with a soft posing radiance nearly unseen.

Rachel reached down for her neckline and scooped out the ambulant in her palm. It glowed  
brighter still with a humming radiance that filled the air like the pink breath of the sunrise in  
morning and suddenly shot out a beam of light toward the nearby wall.

The girl sat motionless for a moment, taking in these developments slowly and reaching out to the spot, drawing back her hand quickly before finding it was not hot and drawing closer.

The wall was dusty in a manner that showed it had not been looked after for many months. Her hand felt the stone carefully before at last finding something  
and trancing it was her fingers, at last digging at it with her finger nails.

It was the outline of a fish, carved out of gold and yellow topaz, inlayed into the stone in a very ingenious hiding place.

Rachel mumbled in effort, giving the figure one last whole hearted tug before it came free in her hand. She turned it over curiously :

Now that she looked at it she could see that its fully shape was about as big as both her hands width and that it had a loop on its top as if it had once bee  
n part of a necklace on a chain as well. She did not have time to examine it any farther before there was another flash.

The fish began to grow smaller and smaller as she watched, stopping at last when it was no bigger than a dime in all.

The firefly flitted forward and back cautiously around the new mini object.

"That sure is odd..I wonder if..." Rachel began, looking giant any marks she may have missed on  
the red stone in her other hand. Upon turning it over she had her most definite answer: There were four silty indented spaces in its casing ,arranged in a circle, one of them which looks sensuously like a fish.

Sensing her disbelief for the moment she causally placed it in the stop, her hand slightly trembling with the force of exam concentration.

The first thing that happened, Rachel was relived to discover, was there was no huge explosion  
like were often shown in old treasure hunting movies. No huge boom, no oddly timed giant rocks to be running from endlessly and perhaps most assuring of all, no disembodied voices laying claim to her immortal soul.  
 _  
They must be working somewhere else tonight_ she concluded.

The second thing however that see noticed without even thinking was a delis warm feeling that came over her body, like a blanket of the emotion of contentment all at once and without any say in the matter.

"Something tells me we're on the right track here, little bug." She yawned, only half thinking of where she was, or whatever thing that was happening tomorrow that she had been so worried  
about..What was it again anyway?

Sleep was a funny thing, when you chased it you were almost gated a restless night but when you fought it you were to sleep within moments.  
Rachel was a case of the latter, as she drifted off down a cloud lined path, listing to half spoken music when...

Rachel awoke with a start. How long had she been out? She looked out the window, the moon was still up, so it couldn't have been very long.  
She put her paw down on the window still, taking in a deep breath of the clean air the creeps its way though the thin bars.  
 _  
Boy my claws look really long today.._ She thought sleepily, and my paws could use a shave...

"PAWS?" She screamed in a tone that taken totally out of contain would still make no sense to any on listener.  
She fumbled with the spots that use to be her hands, finding only short white fur that shin in the moonlight the way all such colored things do at night,  
and small pink pads where their use to be very human finger prints and a very present opposable thumb. She looked down at  
the rest of her body in a mad panic that well suited the reality of sudden metamorphic drama:

She was now strangely slim and light blood in some places and highly muscled in overs in a stream  
lined fashion that only a cat could pull off.

Her dress had somehow remade itself it seemed to comment her new form, her boots even going around her back feet unstopping just shy of her now  
mid hip, the wrist ribbon now was positioned at the base of where her tail was, but for whatever reason she found as she slugged,  
the new dress had not come with any hole for said tail, giving her back side and uncomfortable pinch that she could not reach as she batted for it.

She reached up to her face inside and found just what she would have expected:  
Her eyes felt remarkably bigger, taking up far more room on her face which now as reshaped in a tin smiling muzzle like structure with long  
whiskers that when she touched them, ticked all of her senses at once in a way she had never felt before. It was like having another set of eyes (of all fashion) upon her  
cheeks!

Last of all were her ears. She put off the realization for a moment afraid of what she might find that this was some last true sign of irrefutable cat hood.  
First, the fact that her ears were not in their usual place at their sides of her face stink in then as she traced her hands farther up the fur  
that was her face she winced upon finding two truly ponder , truly fur filled, truly mini bat wing like and her own on top of it all, ears.

Cat ears.

She felt them twitch and then fold down to hug the back of her skull in mastery and fright.  
 _  
No, oh, no, this can not be happening._

She wanted to scream, but all the came out was the longest most pitiful caterwaul she had ever  
heard this side of her neighbors fence, echoing off into the night.

She slapped a paw over her mouth self-consciously and started to cry.

That is, she _tried_ to cry.

As bad as she felt ..as miserable- and -catlike- and- alone -and -going- to- be- killed- at- dawn as she felt, the tears would not come.  
 _  
Of course, cats can't cry...they can't cry at all._

Silently she wondered how many other people..That is, how many _cats_ had spent their nights up here locked away crying without any tears to comfort them...

She was beginning to wallow in have pity, because of the fact that she was letting herself become so pitiful (not an easy feat for all but the most practiced of those with depression with no mirror  
with which to see there transformed faces altered by some unknown magic) when she heard a  
clear bell like clang against the windows bars, making her ears shoot right upward.

She peered out from between the bars, aided a moment later by the little lighting bug that she had  
discovered, which let out a strong halo of light into the unknown night.

The hook attached to the side of the wall was she noticed made out of the twisted thorn coved  
dried grape like vines that embarked the castle outside the moat, fed by the murky water of the  
moat that was slowly moving with some unknown water source feeding it. Tied around that was  
a thick rope that looked very quickly made, as if it had been twisting in form mere moments  
before and never been tested for the weight it was now straining under dangerously.  
"Gragh!" Came a grunt of effort as the firefly flew down to investigate beyond her line of sight  
"Hey, bug, get out of my face would ya?"

"Is someone there?" She asked feeling a bit stupid the second after it left her lips. But feeling  
stupid was nothing new to feeling like she was wearing a silly living cat suit like the type that  
one would wear to a six year old's birthday party.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm somebody and I'm here." The rope waved again and she finally saw the cause  
of it all: The was a cat, and a very big one at that.

If Baron had been tall enough at her new height to make her feel small, this new cat was so big she felt like a feline midget in comparison.

His fur was a pure dirty cream shade of white that bordered somewhere between the length of a  
fashionable Persian and the short scrubbiness of a short haired alley cat. His tail was also odd and  
wildly furry at it's end as though someone had bobbed his tail long ago and all the remaining hair  
that would have been on that other half had gathered together in rebellion in one spot. His muzzle  
was also out of place from the other cats she had seen in her time hear when he chanced to look  
up at her, a thick trunk like one which gave a nearly human like impression of a strong chin, a  
little brown spot on top of his head finished his gruff appearance, seeming not at all out of  
place to suit his manners, or lack thereof.

The name's Muta little miss ..." The bullish cat began

"Oh, I'm..." Rachel replied but did not get far.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." He huffed matter-of-factly "I'm just here to get you out of this tower, not to  
chit chat." He mumbled, pulling his very heavy body up to the window still and beginning to push  
on the bars before stopping for a breath.

"Well I'll be a mouse's uncle! They already did a number on you. Turning human's into cats. It's nearly a religion for them ya know.  
Like some sort of weirdo tally their keeping up there of how many girls they can turn into cats. I never did like that cat-hood should be something your born with or earn,  
just giving it away to every Jane Dick and Henry that falls into the Cat Kingdom is so cheap and uncatlike. You human's have gotta serve _us_ , not the other way around  
with our magic giving you all our good looks and charm and grace and great taste in food besides."

"That's enough!" Rachel shouted "For your information Moonta or whoever you are, my name is  
Rachel, not girl, and I did' not ask, beg or let the cats here turn me into a cat. I found this weird  
fish stone in this weird hole in the wall that just happened to fit into this weird hole in the weird  
amulet the Baron told me to keep safe. So before you start pointing a finger, er, paw at me let me  
tell my side of things first, thank you!"

Muta gazed speechless for a moment and then went back to work as though he had never heard  
anything.

"Ah yeah, Baron found himself a winner this time." He said sarcastically. Rachel just let out a deep flabbergasted sigh in return.

Despite their differences she could not help but be amazed at the new cats ability to began to bend  
the bars as they gave way ever so slowly under his paws. It was as if all of his bad temper was  
embodied in his might and forced against the bars in a manner its makers had never thought of a  
prison having access to.

The dying bending sound of the bars was so loud in Rachel's over sensitive new ears that she was sure any moment a guard would burst in armed to the fangs  
with various killing impalements and decide it was time to do away with her a tad earlier than succeed.

But for all her worries no such thing happened and the cat named Mutta was successful in making  
a hole the size of her head between the bars.

"Squeeze though." He aged quickly

"But it's so small, I'll never fit." She observed

"If it's big enough for the head the feet will follow my Granddad use to say. Now come on! What  
kind of wanta be cat are ya if you can't even squeeze though a hole?"  
 _  
The human kind._ She retorted in her mind sharply, but did not let the words reach her lips for fear  
that the one other living being that was here to get her might change his mind.

"Okay, okay..." She said, pulling the start of her muzzle tentatively between the start of the hole.

As if by some miracle she found that once her head was though the hole her whole body did  
indeed follow her paws, though she did have to go down on all fours to crawl though, which in  
normal times would have felt awkward but now was not as such. The only thing that held her back  
for a moment was the helm of her dress, that with its odd bedraggled glory was easily pulled  
though with the right tug. With a deep breath of relief she found herself out on the freedom of the  
legs, a tiny narrow spot that would have been far too little in her normal form but to her cat  
self offered sitting room and then some.

The same could not be said for the much larger Muta, who was still hanging attached to his hooked rope.

"Hey, would you hurry it up, I'm not getting any lighter or younger here ya know." He remarked

The height of the jump seemed even higher now, the line of water below reflecting a strange  
ghostly twin of the moon on the crystal line that was the mote. She could see now the mounts  
source, a swiftly moving river heading toward the east into the distance.

Muta awkwardly mannered to somehow get the umbrella off and over his head , holding the handle  
in one free paw and fiddling with the automatic opening latch with his mouth. There was a ping  
sound, followed by the flush of fabric against fur and the umbrella sprang open, relating the  
white swirl pattern upon its sides. In normal human terms the umbrella was quite big, large  
enough to fit three people under it comfortably.

To Rachel's new cat vantage point it was as large as a small ceiling and big enough, it seemed, to hold six or seven Muta's without fear.

"Ump!" He snorted, tossing the umbrella down below with a flick of his teeth. It landed far  
between upside down in the water with a satisfying nearly soundless 'flop'.

"Now, jump." He said

"Are you kidding?" Rachel said, trying to let go but finding her fear frozen paws unable to comply.

"Oh, so you wanted to do this the hard fun way huh?" Muta smirked looking down at her with a cruel meaningful glint to his eye.  
 _  
Oh no._ She remarked silently

"GUARDS! THE PRISONER, SHE'S ESCAPING OUT THOUGH THE WINDOW! CATCH  
HER OR IT WILL BE YOUR HEADS!" Muta bellowed, in a voice that sounded so much like  
the king's she could not help but thwich.

The room overhead suddenly rang with the sound of a key opening the door in a great hurry and the sound of boots on the floor moving toward the very  
window they were hanging from. First there were six guards, mean looking tom cats that were all trying to get to them at once ,  
some of them trying to climb out and down the rope, spears flashing. Soon , more and more, a countless number were forcing themselves out like ants from an  
anthill.

Rachel streaked and let go, kicking one as she did so, and Muta let go soon after, pulling down his eyelid in a teasing gesture.

The moments before they finally hit down to the silvery water below seemed to last forever but soon was broken by the freezing cold lucked that knocked all the breath from her lungs.

Muta's thinker fur seemed to safe him the blunt of the impact for seconds later she felt his mouth reaching out to grab the loose skin on the back of her neck and pressing  
her front paws up to the hollow half globe encirclement of the umbrella's upturned surface. She gagged and turned her head  
in a quick snap to look at the spears that were now hissing thought the air down to their craft.

One came within inches of piercing the surface but missed before seconds later the current had carried them out beyond range.

"Won't they come after us?" She asked

"Nah, we cats hate water more than anything. Heck, if Baron himself hadn't asked me even I won't be here in a million years to save you. Rescue from danger is one thing,  
water is a whole other can o' worms."


	6. Whisper Of The Heart In Which Girl and Cat Are Reintroduced

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The darkness waited.

The darkness waited.

It knew.

It knew more than anything living in all the kingdoms what was to be done.

Slowly, surely in its hold of darkness, It could see its two hovering spheres:

One highlighting the Baron falling though space, and the other, two white cats riding in a upturned umbrella down a rushing river, one in a red frilly dress, and the other looking annoyed as a firefly zipped around his head.

Yes, oh yes, everything was finally working as planned, as it had been planned since the

very start. Oh how creations could bring such joy...such fulfillment, when everything fell into

place.

"You called for me boss?" The gruff face of a brown and black cat bowing before the shadow asked.

There was a long silence, as if words were being said but not spoken... as if they need not be, in the long run.

A slip of parchment finally flew out of the air from some unknown angle, with the words upon the browned paper written in the most elegant of ink wording.

The cat read, dropping the paper to the ground a moment later and bowing.

"As you wish." He spoke, putting a monocle up to his eye that glinted in the light.

The last words of 'do away with them' on the paper could be seen before it was whipped away in the wind.

 **  
Chapter 6: In Which The Girl and Cat Are Reintroduced Under Different Terms, and The S.S. Brella Takes Its Maiden Voyage   
**

The mist on the water was as thick as pea soup and hardly as edible, blocking anything that would normal be visitable upon the horizon.

The morning air welcomed it with a chill that was unnoticeable to anyone who was use to such places.

The once human girl Rachel was not one such person..Or cat as the case would be. And the entertanment was doing nothing to improve matters as they were.

 _"Oooh..Fifteen mice on my human's chest (Yo ho ho and a bottle of creeeam!)_

 _I played with five and ate the rest! (Yo ho ho and bottle of creeeam!)_

 _Fifteen mice are good to chew_

 _Yo ho ho and a bottle of creeeam_

 _All for me and none for you_

 _Yo ho ho and bottle of creeeam_

 _Put in a the ice chest, keep em' cold_

 _Yo ho ho and bottle of cream_

 _I'll be eating 'em 'till I'm good and old_

 _Yo ho ho and a bottle of creeeeam!"_

Muta's raspy off key singing voice was interrupted by a long line of gasping curses. Muta's raspy off key singing voice was interrupted by a long line of gasping and gagging curses.

"...bug nearly flew down my throat!" He cursed

"Maybe he did not like your singing. And his name is Flash now, not Bug all right?"

Muta's disbelief did not need to be visible to be seen.

"You named it? That thing? It doesn't need a name, it needs to go away! Once you name something it stays around forever..."

"Well, I didn't name you did I?"

The firefly flew about her head, landing on her paw with a little beeping sounded like a sharp

retort. Rachel gentility placed the insect back into her much warmer purse in comparison to the

air outside and rubbed her shoulders.

 _It's funny, you would think having fur would keep you warmer in times like this._ She pondered.

Her new white coat had dried hours ago, but little heat had returned to its birth place. She remembered now the cats that had belonged to the other people in her apartment complex and their pitiful mewing to be let in and be petted even though they were streakily outdoor cats, wet with the morning dew and the last nights rain.

Rachel made a mental note to set out warm milk for them if she was ever lucky enough to see home again...

 _Mm, milk_ she added in longing.. _or_ _anything would really do._

This fresh fog filled air in its crispness reminded her of how long ago it had been since she last really ate a real meal.

She drew her arms (or were they front legs now? She pondered) up closer around her chest and her teeth chattered, a massive growl from her stomach all of a sudden braking their non speaking stalemate.

She could just barely make out a small swift in Muta's feathers though the mist.

He turned with a growl and sat on the over edge of the umbrella boat, looking into the pasting, now rainbow tinted water from the just now sun climbing into the sky.

What is he doing?

"Muta?"

"Shh..." He replied his tail twitching stilly where he now sat like a huge statue to some forgotten cat god of plenty.

Then with a quick flash of a paw and claws into the water he scooped up a moment later, the reward of which was a mere blur of silver that flew though the air.

Something in Rachel snapped for the first time and her whole body took on a life of its own leaping toward the fast moving whatever it was.

Must...catch..move..fast...hunt..kill... Her mind was an excited buzz as she took a few pats at the whatever it was and at last pinned it down. Her eyes slowly grew smaller and back to normal and her mind followed soon after from the land of pure insult.

"A... fish?" She questioned The bright glossy silver body before her was indeed a fish, now marked here and there was bright fleshy holes from her claws which she now slowly retracted from it.

The fish's mouth and eyes seemed to both be gasping for breath when Rachel was shocked

to hear...

"Help meeee..help meeee...caaaat, caaat!" The fish spoke , small and just as pitiful as it looked.

"That, that fish..j..ust..talked!" She said in surprise pointing, her ears moving steadily backward

"Of course it did." Muta said very matter-of-factly, and with a lighting speed quickness of a cat half his size he reached out with a sizable paw and scooped up the fish (which she was just about to say had very pretty and uncommon looking scales) from her and popped it into his mouth whole, the fishs' life ending with a muffled scream somewhere between the cats mouth and his stomach.

"Of course, we are in the fish kingdom now you know. All fish can talk. Now hunt and eat your breakfast and stop whining !"

Rachel now sat looking at the passing water with great distaste, the schools of silver fish passing below them all too viewable in the clear water.

"But..but I can't eat anything that can talk to me..." She moaned

"Then you are in for a very hungary journey girly, because 'round here, nearly anything can yak

your ears off if you don't start munch'n 'em with their head first..."

Rachel sighed and looked at the water again, her stomach adding another sharp comment to the silence as Muta began to snoop fish after fish out of the water and eat them all in a quick process that would having put most tuna caning places back on earth to shame.

She batted at the water half-heartily and was just about to give the common place ways of the primal cat a try in the name of her belly, (talking be damned), when she remembered the contents of her purse.

The candy! She had candy! She had never felt so overjoyed for having elements of pure

unrated crabs on her person before.

She reached in her purse and came out with the little round orange tin,

her new paws taking a few more moments than it would normally take to open it than she would have been able to do normally.

She licked her lips, such as they were now, and looked down at the little amber drops of pure un-talking fish like bliss.

"What are those?" Muta asked almost making her stand bolt upright in surprise at his food

seeking breath on her neck.

"Their altoids Tangerine flavored altoids. Haven't you ever heard of them?" She asked

Muta shook his head, transfixed by the discovery.

Rachel laughed at his look "Well, they are a pretty old brand and very good..would you like to try one?"

Muta nodded and reached out, suddenly pulling the whole tin from her grasp.

"Hey, Muuuta! Not them all, I want some to.. their very..sour..."

What happened next made her double over in laughter despite herself:

The big ooff's whole mouth seemed to suck in on top of it's self and his eyes watered more than

she had ever seen on a cat before. If it had not been for the fact that he had swallowed half of

them without so much as tasting them she was almost sure the big cat's mouth would never

have any hope of returning to normal.

A sharp buzzing sound suddenly broke up the light moment and went darting

overhead. The two cats looked up at the sky in unison as it flowed a pale blue among a thick

layer of clouds to mirror the twin layer of fog on the water. The red dot upon the sky whipped

over again, this time a even smaller spot noticeable on top of it, easily seen with feline eyes.

"Baron?" Muta mumbled

"It's the Baron! ... Baron!" She yelled waving with suddenly renewed vigor "It's really him, we're saved!"

She stood up on tip toe reaching toward the sky, Muta even down joined in the attempted

flagging down.

"It's not good. He's riding a Blast Beetle, those things go too quick for anyone to keep track of things below, let alone slow down even if he did see us."

"What's a blast Beetle, and why would he be riding one?" She asked, but soon got her answer as

the shape grew closer and nearly hit their small craft , sending it swirling in the water, stirring up

small waves. Rachel yelped as the large red shelled beetle with it's energy brimmed eyes zoomed

up to touch the heavens overhead and was soon followed by a blue beetle that rocked them again

and a flock of what looked like silver winged dragonflies bringing up the rear.

"They're chasing him!" She gasped

"Way to state the obvious ya know." Muta said with a mumble as he was now using all of his furry

mass to balance the umbrella out and keep them from titling after the high speed assault from

above.

He was adding some muffled comment half to himself about Baron always seeming to

find his way into such messes when the bugs began to shoot at the Baron.

The long silver harpoon

like stingers wheeled though the air at the cat's small living craft, he skillfully dodging here and

there like a airborne dancer of combat when a single one, not in full defected by his ever

faithful cane impaled itself in his shoulder. The sheer momentum of the blow threw the

gentleman off his mount, sending him wheeling into the open air, free-falling to the sea below

with all certainty, to crash there.

There are certain things one never gets around to asking one's self, one such question would be :

If two cats are in an umbrella traveling down a fairly claim small sea at the rate of (x) will they be able to catch the well dressed cat gentleman (y) who had just been shoot with a silver stinger of questionable origin (z) in time before he pummels in the unknown depths (a)?

Rachel suddenly wished that she was a bit better at math.

As his body fell though the air they saw him slowly but surly flip over to avoid landing on his

head, his small paws heading down first before touching down to the water, slipping in far too

silently for a moving body.

"Oh, great."Muta breathed, looking down at the patch of water where the Baron had just slipped in with great distaste.

"Is he hurt you think? " Rachel pondered, looking down at the water with concern but somehow

as unable to take action as the cat beside her.

Why did the water suddenly seem like an icy barrier of doom?

Of course she wanted to help..But she just could make her self leap into the

depths..Of course she could swim, it certainly was not that...

"Yep, seen it before. Makes him even harder to get out really..Those stingers were not made to

make real flesh and blood wounds, at least not on us..."

Muta took a deep breath and stared down the water like it was a true living enemy.

"Just saying I wouldn't do this for anyone but you

boss." he commented before yelling a loud "CANNONBALL!" and flinging himself in the

water.

Rachel might have been just as well if she had decided to help at that moment, for Muta's

body quickly displaced what seemed like a full gallon of salt water with his jump,

which kicked up a small tidal wave, soaking her body though so that her white fur and red dress

now hung on her body like a deflated Christmas balloon and filled up the umbrella halfway to

where it seemed in very real danger of stinking.

"Me and my big mouth.." She spat, beginning to

use her semi-empty purse to bail out water in a smoggy, tired, and hungary manner.

Flash flew out of the enclosure of the bag just then, coughing and sputtering, and alighted on her head, washing his salt logged wings and beeping what she could only guess was the insect equivalent of very colorful sailor language.

She was just starting to feel like making up an old fashion work song suitable for bailing when

Muta's head popped out of the surface of the water, his clinched teeth clamped around familiar

looking white fabric suit cuff.

"Helpp..! Getting too heeeavy" He groaned

Rachel's ears perched in curiously as she reached out to take some of the Baron's weight upon

herself.

Muta seemed like such a strong cat, highly able to lift the Baron's much smaller form

with ease.

Why was he having such trouble? As soon as she reached out she got her answer:

Baron was no longer himself. That was, not his living self. The area below his coat that had been

hit deeply by the stinger had the glossy sheen of porcelain once more, as did his head and a good

section of his chest and lower body. Even now as she helped hail him up she could see the lack of life spreading downward toward his tail and making him in turn with a lightening fast quickness he figure she had remembered.

Finally making his whole body get on to the umbrella Muta hung onto the side of it, worn out more than he would admit.

Rachel gaze suddenly looked in horror as the combined weight of the Baron quickly losing life-force and Muta had began to make the air around the umbrella fill with tell tale ripping sounds. First low and musical and then fast and frightening.

If they did not do something quick, they would all drown, here in the middle of nowhere!

The girls' mind raced.

Who knew how far it was to the next land mass, and without their boat there was little hope of even reaching it in the long run without even any driftwood in sight.

"We have to do something..but..what, what?" She asked softly, as the magical wave of dis-animation traveled down his hands.

"You better think quick, I've done my deed for the month thanks. Gotta pull your own weight

around here sister" Muta interjected. Flash landed on the bright silver stinger just then, cleaning

his legs between two of the evil looking barbs of it.

"Pull, that is it! Muta, you are a genus!" She said, reaching toward the stinger with her dripping

wet paws.

"Of course I am, everyone that's anyone knows that ya know." Muta scoffed, shaking a wayward

fish from his ear.

Rachel grabbed hold of the stinger tightly with both of her new small white paws and pulled with

a sharp tug. The stinger gave way only a forth of an inch stubbornly. Rachel silently cursed the

added missing leverage of her thumbs and looked down at the sting like a unspoken challenge.

With a growl of fussration she tentatively bent down, slowly and carefully placing her jaws in a clamp around the stinger between two barbs (thanks to her now much narrower head) and bent back in a full bodied pull.

The stinger gave way an inch more with the sound of nails upon a black-broad from grinding though Baron's now fired body.

Rachel grinned savagely and put her jaws and paws tighter still, bending doubled over with a flexibly she did not even know she had and branching her hind legs against the

Baron for one last mighty pull.

The stinger came loose in her mouth finally, her momentum throwing her over backward into the water with a splash, the stinger itself falling off into the water behind her with a sharp 'snig' sound that could only be made by high end magic, but to her unknowing ears just sounded like the sweet ring of success.

She came up with a laugh, nearly having to drag herself onto the umbrella again as the sea water added unexpected weight to her skirt.

She finally gave up the fight and unfastened the skirt part of her dress swiftly by uniting its

red ribbon, swinging her now much freer solely bloomer-ed legs onto the craft and noticing once

more the sadly lacking hole for her new tail in them. Which made the new appendage , tucked away on her backside, uncomfortably itchy and wet besides.

 _Where are a pair of scissors when you_ _need them_ she mused thoughtfully, turning to look at the Baron, who it would seem, she was able

to de-sticker just in time. But if I am this lucky this soon in the story she added to herself, that can

not be a good sign.

Things always get worst before they get better after all, and using up all the

before in so much success did not seem in her favor this early in the plot.

Much unlike the the strong flash of light that welcomed him into breath at first, the reanimation of the Baron this time was a slow wave white that enveloped the figure and brought back the slow sure breath to his lungs and a steady beat to his heart.

Rachel's own breath caught in her throat as the Baron opened his eyes and they lengthened to slits in the light, realizing this was the first time he had ever beheld her as a cat.

The moment seemed frozen in time as the wind whipped though their fur, as Muta sat in the background, cleaning his face thoughtlessly with a paw.

Slowly, silently, he raised her paw to his mouth and kissed it.


End file.
